The blue and golds looked a much better team than the green, rather naive, outfit which fell to Tasman a week ago, and there was a hint of promise in its performance.
It was more desperate, quicker round the field, and put together some impressive five-pointers to show it will not fall over and die when the ITM Cup starts next week.
It proceeded to score three tries in a row and managed to hold off the southern side, which scored a try near the end.
Southland tried to run the ball from within sight of its own goal line at the death to win the game but the Otago defence refused to buckle and Southland pushed one pass too many.
Otago coach Tony Brown said his side knew this week what was coming.
"Last week was good for us as it gave us a taste of what it is about. We put a lot of work this week into our defence out in the pouring rain," Brown said.
"Apparently, Otago has not beaten Southland in a first-class match since 2008 so that is good to get a win over them. We want to play the game at speed and that is something we have been working on over the past couple of months and at times today it came together."
The Otago attack was helped by a lightning pass from halfback Fumiaka Tanaka. His ability to get to the breakdown and get the ball moving again quickly helped Otago get a roll-on at times.
Also helping the Otago cause was the loose forward trio of Gareth Evans, TJ Ioane and captain Paul Grant.
Grant was all over the field, both in attack and defence, Evans made some big hits and grabbed the odd turnover and Ioane showed fine running skills and pulled off some nice offloads.
Grant said after the game he was pleased with the improvement the side had made.
"That was a lot better than last week. We stepped up and and showed what we can do, especially on defence, hitting them hard," Grant said.
"We've got to expect that intensity every week. Last week for the first 20 minutes we were standing back and waiting. This week we were really urgent and got a lot of bodies into rucks and showed some good line speed."
Otago made a poor start to the match, dropping off a couple of tackles and mucking up a lineout.
Southland lock Josh Bekhuis crossed after five minutes and it was looking ominous for the home side.
But after Hayden Parker banged over a penalty, Otago lock Rob Verbakel scored a nice try, coming from Otago moving the ball down the field with nice carries by lock Shota Horie and winger Buxton Popoali'i.
Popoali'i then scored the next try when Otago attacked down the left and Southland simply ran out of defenders.
Southland, though, came back into the game scoring twice in the final five minutes of the first half to go into the break 19-15 up.
Southland lock Alex Ryan then bagged a try early in the second half but Otago never got out the white flag.
Jayden Spence showed strength to score out wide, after he was put on the wing.
Glenn Dickson then up-ended Kade Poki with a classical tackle under Southland's posts and Evans picked up the ball to dot down halfway through the second half.
That put Otago ahead, and Peter Breen, who had come on for Parker, slipped over, again out wide to score Otago's fifth try with just over five minutes left.
First five-eighth Marty McKenzie did some good things for Southland and fullback Mark Wells ran hard.
The sight of loose forward John Hardie leaving the field with a foot injury within five minutes of kick-off would not have warmed the hearts of Southland supporters.
Otago v Southland
The scores
Otago ... 32
Rob Verbakel, Buxton Popoali'i, Jayden Spence, Gareth Evans, Peter Breen tries, Hayden Parker con, pen, Breen con
Southland ... 31
Josh Bekhuis, Tim Cornforth, Mark Wells, Alex Ryan, Campbell Smith tries, Marty McKenzie 3 con
Halftime: 19-15
Southland Crowd: 1200
